Apparently, the pages I’ve got set up for the desktop version of the blog don’t work on mobile, and my google-fu is failing to get them fixed. So, for now…

My list of chapter snarks can be found here.

And my list of book reviews can be found here.

Just rereading my latest chapter post for ACOTAR, and there’s an interesting little line that I completely forgot about, but has pretty big implications for Feyre’s angst in ACOMAF (which I’m partway through writing the reviews for now, and damn I wish I’d remembered this earlier…)

This takes place just after Feyre has been asked to stab the first faerie in her third task, as she’s still wrestling with whether or not she can do it:

Darkness rippled near the throne, and then Rhysand was there, arms crossed - as if he’d moved to better see. His face was a mask of disinterest, but my hand tingled. Do it, the tingling said.

So, essentially, there’s a non-zero chance that Rhysand mind-controlled her into doing it, or at least tipped the balance mentally. We have, after all, already seen him mind-controlling Feyre into doing what he wants in this book (most notably, forcing her to drink the wine after she refused). We know he’s not above it, no matter what his words claim, now or later. Actions speak louder, after all.

In the next book, much of Feyre’s depression and self-loathing stems from this action, this killing of others. Which, if it’s not something she actually chose to do herself, but rather something Rhysand pushed her into… and the book never so much as even acknowledges this, all while Rhysand is swooping in and “saving” her from that depression… yeah.

I mean, I’m already of the opinion that he was responsible for a sizeable portion of her trauma UtM, given he was drugging and SA-ing her for two months straight (which has yet to be even mentioned in ACOMAF, btw. I’m like 60% through it at this point. Book is just straight-up ignoring it), but yeah. This just takes it to a whole new level.

And honestly, it kinda sucks. It’s one of the few scenes in ACOTAR that was written decently well, and as I said in the chapter review, it’s a great bit of conflict to have for the protagonist - she’s not a murderer, but killing these faeries will free everyone. And she understandably feels guilty, even though the action did so much good. But this just completely undermines it. Now, we can’t trust that it’s a messed-up choice she had to make, that she chose to make for the good of everyone, and that that messed her up - no, the choice may well have been made for her, by Rhysand, to serve his own self interest. Yet another way in which she is his victim.

For my final task, I was given my old tunic and pants—

Now, I may just be misremembering. But, apart from Rhysand’s skimpy dresses, has she been given any other clothes at all? Or is this meant to inform us that this is the first time she’s worn anything but those skimpy dresses in two months?

I swear, every time I think the situation can’t get worse, it does. Rhysand is the absolute fucking worst.

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Let’s knock this shit out.

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We open the night before Feyre’s third task, where she is once again attending Rhysand at a party. She’s essentially decided that she’s going to die, and is just waiting for Rhys to give her permission/order her to drink the wine so she can “get it over with.” God, this is bleak. Poor Feyre. I don’t even like her, but it’s hard not to feel sorry for her in this situation.

I just wanted it done. I wanted that wine to carry me through this last night and bring me to my fate.

Seriously. And, while I’m sure she would also be depressed even without Rhysand’s attentions, I can’t help but feel like she wouldn’t sound quite so utterly crushed as she does here. Remember, Feyre at her first task had a very different outlook on how things were going to go. Then Rhysand got involved, and it’s all been downhill for her (mentally) since then.

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Hunt stared at his severed wings, mounted on the wall high above the Asteri’s thrones.
Shahar’s pristine white wings were displayed above his, still glowing after all these centuries, right in the center of the array. Isaiah’s were to the left of Hunt’s. So many wings. So many Fallen. All preserved here.

Yeah… this would mean so much more if they didn’t just fucking grow back. Could you imagine? Hunt, ground-bound for centuries, having lost such a crucial piece of his identity as an angel… and only now, right after another (apparently) thwarted attempt at rebellion, does he see his severed wings again at last. The biggest fuck-you to his character I could imagine.

Alas, he got a new pair, so it’s all G. But don’t tell the book that, oh no. It’s the Worst Thing Ever. Fuck, it’s like getting a haircut and then expecting the same level of sympathy as an amputee just because someone displayed your hair on a wall. Get over yourself, Hunt.

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It’s second task day today! And it starts of pretty dull. Feyre is taken to Amarantha, who behaves like a cartoon, and the Attor is there, and it also behaves like a cartoon. And also Tamlin is still saying nothing and Feyre still hasn’t solved the riddle. Great. Now that we’ve established that nothing has changed here, the second task!

The floor of the room begins sinking, until Feyre is lowered into a pit. There’s an iron grate separating it into two halves, and through the grate, she can see Lucien chained to the floor.

Again he was to be Amarantha’s toy to torment.

Yeah. Guy just can’t catch a break. I think this is part of why I like him tbh, he’s the only one who ever cops consequences, both for his own actions and other people’s actions. It’s hella unfair, and we all love an underdog.

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We open with Tharion. Words cannot express how little I care about what happens to him.

There’s guns and stuff. The human in the mech suit tries to shoot Tharion, but Tharion is too fast. See, even with the magitech mechs, the Vanir are still So Much Better than the humans. They literally just don’t want to surrender even an inch of the power margin. Assholes.

Pippa shoots Cormac. Tharion starts going on about how he totally wouldn’t leave him, but uh, his fins, or something.

He had four hours to reach water. The rebels would use that against him. And he might have sold his life away to the Viper Queen, but to live without his fins … He wasn’t ready to lose that piece of his soul.

Well, you should have thought about that before you went to the lab without soaking in the water, Tharion. You literally arrived in a submarine. There is no excuse. You are too fucking stupid to live.

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So, Robin Hobb is one of those authors I’d always see in the bookshop, but have never actually read any of the works of. This one, Assassin’s Apprentice, was my first. And… actually, it was really good. I already have the next two books. I think I’ll give it… hmm. I want to (and will) say A, because a B+ is definitely too low I think, and I can’t think of anything specific that would make it A-? I just feel like I’ve been giving As easily lately haha. But, anyway.

I will try and steer clear of major spoilers, but can’t guarantee there will be none.

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TW - this chapter contains more of Rhysand’s nonsense, specifically, the whole drugging-and-skimpy-dress thing. As a result, this post will contain discussions of sexual assault.

It’s also hella long. Soz not soz.

Feyre is in her cell, summarising the past few days of not much happening. She credits Rhysand with the now-regular meals that are arriving for her, and also ponders the hardest riddle in the world, but of course gets nowhere with it.

I wondered if [Rhys put the eye tattoo on her hand] to quietly remind me of Jurian—a cruel, petty slap to the face indicating that perhaps I was well on my way to belonging to him just as the ancient warrior now belonged to Amarantha.

I mean. Is she wrong? She does kind of end up trapped in Rhysand’s court and bound to him forever.

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